repairisntcheap

One of my most fond programming experiences was using tcl/expect to create a custom web interface for an IBM Tivoli tape library. The stock web interface was too expensive for a college with a few thousand users, and didn't provide adequate access control to allow our users to restore ONLY their own files.

Yes, wrapping a telnet session is a hack... But it was a hell of a hack that did everything we needed!

Nice... I think this is often good a good strategy, but super big companies like Google have a lot of noise on Twitter. Opening up your own, unique, support channel, like this company has done can sometimes be more successful because everyone loves a great story.

Of course, if you can just get great press from targeted ads to Google, hopefully you don't have to be more creative to get someone's attention.

I decided to escalate support with a major multi billion dollar tech company in a unique way... I took a one-way plane ticket to the city of their HQ, went to the front desk, then when I was rebuffed, i escalated my issues to a major news outlet. .. I also considered Facebook live right in front of their headquarters on public property, but fortunately didn't need to... I was very polite about everything... Never demanding or angry- always expressing gratitude for the incredible opportunity I had with this company! Amazingly, my unorthodox escalation procedure worked-- I wasn't sure if it would.

My point in writing this is to say- great job thinking outside the box! Even if you can't fly to Google HQ, continue to think outside the box. Some ideas include Hire someone at taskrabbit or Craigslist, or a FB jobs page, to go to their front desk, or if unsuccessful, to hold a sign on public property in front of Google's HQ, you can get a banner or sign professionally made (online process are pretty reasonably priced). You could Skype with your stand-in. It would be really fun to get a Skype video call on a big iPad... or try something else.

Everybody thought I was crazy. I was. Crazy people get noticed, and often get results. Whatever the outcome, being able to tell an awesome story is always fun! Good luck, mate!

Laptop repair companies are disappearing for another reason, too... Brand new laptops are cheap. If your product is cheap to buy, it's harder to make money repairing the product.